Great stuff. Ebook formatting isn't fun, but it's not too bad. I did a lot of research by watching videos like that and reading about all the different ways writers have done it. Now, formatting for a print book is a whole different ballgame.

Bought a book from Amazon on how to format E books. It was so frustrating and confusing I gave up. Should not have purchased it in an E-book format, but the printed version instead. (Guess the author wasn't as good as the jacket made himself out to be if he can't even format his own Ebook decently.)

Thanks so much for doing this, Carrie! For those who want some credentials, I'll let you know that I've built websites for Walt Disney Studios for more than 6 years and eBook formatting is based upon website HTML code. So, rest assured that I know what I'm doing, folks. It's a little complicated and technical, if you're not familiar with that stuff. But if you can follow along, my guide allows you to construct very clean and efficient eBooks.

Thanks. Yeah, I refuse to allow automated software to "convert" things for me. As an experienced programmer, I've seen first hand that 9 times out of 10, those conversion programs produce code about as clean as a crackhoes naughty bits.

Why not just write your book in the final format? That's what I do for print. I never need to reformat because my books are composed in their final format including font choices, page margins, and everything.

I always used DOC files, but I hear a lot about how I should be using HTML. Just looking at this made me even more afraid to tackle it. I used to write HTML all the time but never learned the newer languages. But I will try this one and see if I can do it.

If you already know basic HTML, you will be able to handle this, no problem. My tutorial files already packaged up all the complicated stuff for you. All you are really doing is going in and changing content. You won't need to know other languages either. Even the CSS is already done.

Thanks for this information. I have to digest it first though. I learned to format using the Smashwords guide. Thought I'd tear my hair out on the first attempt, but it got easier as I went along. Now, I enjoy doing it because of the extra touches I can add. Thanks again.

Carrie was frustrated too. But as I kept explaining to her, once you complete your own formatting once, you will have a template to do your subsequent books. I was helping her every single day when she was formatting "Strength" but she managed to format "Courage" all on her own.

seriously crazy how you can learn to do things with a click of the mouse and watching it on a feed!! i'm going to save this post and show my kids when they are older is this is how we learned to do stuff when we didn't know how...wonder what they'll say. geez mom...just ask the stan the holographic buddy.